Review: Pig Destroyer - “Phantom Limb”

When I first popped this in my CD player, I wasn’t paying %100 attention to what was going on. I could swear there was ten minutes of ultra-fast chaos, and I thought “Damn, for a grind band, they sure can make a fast epic grind song actually work!”. Then I looked at the counter, and it was on track seven. So holy crap, they can jam a whole bunch of fast short songs together and make them seem like one big epic thing.

After a few more listens, I felt like I was listening to the audio equivalent of a trilogy, kind of like Stars Wars, you know, the three first ones? No, the real first three movies, the ones that didn’t suck, and didn’t try to substitute special efforts for things like an actual story, or PLOT.

So the first part of “Phantom Limb” has all those fast cool songs crammed all together, like taking all the cool stuff you have in your bedroom, and putting it in a closet temporarily to hide it because your grandmother will be sleeping in YOUR room. It’s also where the story first gets established, like when Luke sees the Death Star and says “I’ve got a bad feeling about this...”

The middle is where the worst problems in the story are. The music slows down a bit with some samples ripped off from good movies to let you know when a song ends. Near the end of that, you’re faced with a strange revelation, kind of like what Luke says after Darth Vader reveals the awful truth - “You can never be my father!”

The end is where it all ties itself up, and speeds up a bit more towards a climactic ending. Your thrown a few unexpected things, like that guitar flanging thing that sounds like a jet taking off, and it’s like your being set up for an ambush. “Luke, it’s a trap!’

The music itself has drums that sound like the drummer got into a fist fight with some of the band members, and was forced to play as fast as possible or else he’d be beaten with a lead pipe. Except of course for those couple of times when the band just decided to change their mind, and beat with a pipe anyways, and say “I thought I told you to slow it down!” just to find a reason to smack him again.

The vocals sound like they were recorded into a cheap microphone that distorts when people talk too loud into it. The vocalist sounds like he spent the previous night at a bar trying to yell every conversation until his lost his voice, and then severed a vocal chord.

The riffs on the album sound like guitarist was locked in a closet without food for three days, and told he’d better come up with something good, or his family would be killed. In order to come up with some riffs fast, it seems like the guitarist tried to think of all the best riffs he’d ever thought of his entire life, no matter what genre they were. Could be hardcore styled chords, could be 80's thrash, or it could be some dirty old rock ‘n roll. For the recording, he probably tuned up his guitar as fast as he could in fifteen seconds, and beat the crap out of his guitar until all the songs were recorded in one take in the same day, and then he was thrown back in the closest.

The distortion from the guitars sounds like somebody stole an amp from a rock-star wannabes garage, then the thieves walked into a studio and forced the staff to make it sound as good as they could. At gunpoint.

The recording sounds like a studio hostage situation that was recorded in one day, where the recording staff was told they had to do the best recording possible, or else a terrorist organization would kill them when they least expected it. By planting a bomb in every staff members car at some random point in time when they least expected it.

So of course all that together makes for the most kick-ass album I’ve heard all year.

5/5

Pig Destroyer
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Review: Despised Icon - “The Ills Of Modern Man”

Unlike many other bands, Despised Icon has made huge leaps and bounds in terms of quality and creativity between each full-length. Their first full-length, “Consumed by your Poison” was a fairly standard grind album that gained a lot of comparisons to Dying Fetus (although I personally don’t see the connection). By contrast, the next album “The Healing Process” basically took every heavy, harsh, and caustic portion from both death metal and hardcore, and threw them together in tempo-shifting grindy package. I felt that “The Healing Process” had it’s shortcomings, as the nature of the tempo jumps in every song caused many of the songs to blur together, and there was also that lack of hooks as well. “The Healing Process” did manage to win people over on intensity and ferocity though.

Here we are today with “The Ills Of Modern Man”. The album brings over the death metal and hardcore elements just like “The Healing Process” did, but this time around, the tempo shifts aren’t as huge between songs, and making the general speed of the songs a bit more consistent leads to giving individual songs a bit more personality. What’s also new is the slight hint of 90's groove metal in small dashings in all of the songs. You can expect to hear some mid-paced thrash-attacked riff mixed with some death beats that start to get close to double bass triplets. It’s not southern tinged like Pantera, but the groove serves it’s point nonetheless.

Actual song-writing elements have been improved, as there are some songs where parts repeat. It’s not quite a verse-chorus format, as the listener still meets new song parts often. The level at which the songs captivate the listener with something that’s much catchier on this album as opposed to the previous album is also much more apparent.

“The Ills Of Modern Man” is not without it’s flaws. One vocalist in particular (since the band has two) sometimes employs the use of ultra low “pig squeals” also known to some as the “death burp”. While I have nothing against such vocalisations, they’re not clear, as the person doing those vocals needs to shape their mouth in such a way that it’s difficult to pronounce words. Both vocalists also tend to hold their screams all the time as well, rather than allowing any of the words to be spouted out in any quick manner. Doing this all the time really drags the vocals out, and lowers the intensity of harsh vocals as an instrument. Almost all the songs on “The Ills Of Modern Man” have a portion that slows down tremendously, almost moving at the speed of an aging tortoise. This wouldn’t be a problem if perhaps the riffs could catch and take hold, but the slow portions often feel as though the band is holding themselves back, and as a result, almost every gets held back a little as well.

Considering the leaps and bounds in the level of quality Despised Icon has been able to show with each successive release, their next album should land on some “best of” lists for whatever year it might be released. Until that time, “The Ills Of Modern Man” comes pretty close.

3.5/5

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Review: Beneath The Massacre - “Mechanics Of Dysfunction”

Quebec has had history of very technical and extreme bands, considering the history of Kataklysm, Cryptopsy and Gorguts. One could also measure the amount of experimental and creative energy of those bands, with Kataklysm being a classic standard bearer on one side, and Gorguts representing how far extreme music can toy with new ideas on the other. Beneath The Massacre is much like Kataklysm in that they represent technical death metal, rather than push it forward.

The formula for the typical Beneath The Massacre song is a mixture of Necrophagist style guitar runs on top of ultra fast blasting drums, with lots of “What if Meshuggah played death metal?” styled single note polyrhythm breakdowns. On top are a pretty low deep tone of death barks spouting the ills of modern society and corporate abuse. And well... that’s it. It’s an intense mixture that’s both powerful and fun live, but with every song being a clone of one another, the beatdown begins to chip away at the listener until the end of the album.

A constant fistfight of guitars and drums would do well in a radio mix of extreme music, as there is the odd hook hidden in a breakdown or guitar run. “The Mechanics Of Dysfunction” is also pretty inoffensive to the standard death metal fan as well, but for the average fan of generally extreme music, “The Mechanics Of Dysfunction” doesn’t quite reach “must have” status.

3/5

Beneath The Massacre
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Review: Job For A Cowboy - “Genesis”

I had heard the songs “Knee Deep”, “Entombment Of A Machine”, and “Entities” through free downloading provided by Job For A Cowboy. Those songs come off of the “Doom” EP. Those were some very well written grind/deathcore songs, so I was a bit surprised to find that the rest of the songs from the “Doom” EP were a bit more like filler. Although, I do have to say that Job For A Cowboy forged a unique signature sound right from the get-go.

“Genesis” improves upon all the good qualities that were there on the “Doom” EP. The band is now more extreme jumping from break-neck speeds to slow gloomy parts on the fly. The tempo jumps are some of the biggest and harshest I’ve heard in a long time. They’re tighter than ever before, no doubt from all the touring to support the previous effort. All the instruments are heavier and more powerful due to the good production, no doubt from the money that Metal Blade was willing do dump into this band to back them.

Jonny Davy has a signature voice, and could soon be competing with George “Corpsegrinder” Fisher for his technical word delivery of spouting off lots of words in a very catchy, rhythmic fashion. A slightly closer inspection of Jonny Davy’s vocals reveals that he isn’t quite pronouncing his vowels properly, and while he does pronounce his consonants, it’s almost as though he’s not saying the proper consonant when the time comes. Of course, if you’re not reading the wonderfully written lyrics along with the music, you’ll probably not notice these very minor shortcomings.

Lyrically the whole album is focussed on religious themes like Armageddon, conflict, and the uprising of evil. This could lead one to think that Job For A Cowboy are a Christian band, which may very well be true, but make no mistake, their message is definitely not an attempt to push any agenda. The religious aspect instead serves more as a backdrop to a story.

With the exception of the massive tempo jumps, the album is pure death metal, and at that, quite unlike any death metal band to date with such a different sound. The two guitar work seems to go through just about every combination of dual guitar work you can think of, from harmonies, solos, to bleak melodies on top of a rhythm guitar. If you listen hard, and I mean very hard, in a song or two you can hear some guitar trills similar to Cannibal Corpse. The band seems to love Suffocation styled drum blasts, and they’re used often with machine gun like firing from the snare drum. The slow, ultra heavy, gloomy, and atmospheric portions that show up in just about every song due to the tempo shifting nature, along with the constantly duelling guitars playing off of each other, to the instrumental segueways bring to mind Morbid Angel. The song “The Divine Falsehood” stands out as being a slow powerful song that takes some heavy inspiration from Morbid Angel. It’s just to bad that the song hangs on repeating itself on the second half, as it could’ve been an much more notable track.

Every song has some sort of moshable part for the metal crowd, if not several. To building up to fast crowd pleasers, to a slow steady pulse to make a circle pit, to some more choppier heavy breakdowns to bang ones head too, which might in fact get those pit ninjas and floor punchers jumping into the pit as well. There’s plenty of mosh to go around. Don't worry for those of you who don't like anything "core", as every breakdown is a metal style breakdown.

“Genesis” would get top score if there wasn’t something holding it back. The band knows how to turn just about every riff and vocal line into a hook, and most of the songs are spent attempting to build up to something. As a listener, sometimes you’ll reach that destination, typically being some sort of breakdown, and sometimes you won’t, and then song will just end. It’s seems with the inherently choppy nature of the tempo changes which sometimes seem akin to the introduction of thrash song, it’s as though many songs are constantly building up even right before the ending. Most of the songs are two and a half minutes long, so many could’ve used some rearranging bringing some other parts back, as they almost feel unfinished. At only thirty minutes, with build-ups and hooks all over the place, “Genesis” is like eating half of the best steak you’ve had in your life.

4.5/5

Job For A Cowboy
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Review: Car Bomb - “Centralia”

I first heard about Car Bomb from a positive review of their demo. I then met the guitarist a few months later at the New England Metal and Hardcore Festival giving out the very same demo. I spoke to the guitarist, and how the band didn’t want to get signed, so imagine my surprise several more months later when I found out they signed to Relapse.

Right from the start, Car Bomb wears their influences on their sleeve, those influences being Dillinger Escape Plan and Meshuggah, and even a little Faith No More. Unlike most Meshuggah Escape Plan style bands, Car Bomb actually use their influences to inspire some strange ideas. Centralia uses their influence blatantly about 1/8th to 1/4 of the time. From Meshhuggah, expect to hear polyrhythms, and string detuning styled riffs. From Dillinger Escape Plan come the clean jazz interludes, the strange runs and dissonant chord movements. From Faith No More comes the strange vocalisations, such as the vocal harmonies in “H5N1“, and something of a semi-rapped passage in “Solid Grey”.

Vocalist Michael Dafferner has an immediately recognizable voice, with his mostly mid range/slight high bark. He achieves most of his vocal variety more often with the rhythm he shouts at, rather than moving his scream higher or lower.

When the band isn’t making use of their influences, they don’t seem to fall in all the same traps most math/jazz/tech/spazz/core bands do. There’s the odd strange guitar run or smashing of a dissonant chord, but “Centrailia” isn’t teeming with those same elements the whole time. What the band instead prefers to do is move around with staccato start and stop style shifts, and then throw in strange effects and bits of noise. The high jagged screechings from the guitar stabs at the eardrums, but every now and then the bits of ambient noise can go on for a bit too long, sometimes for more than just a few seconds right smack dab in the middle of a song.

In the end, Car Bomb hasn’t quite managed to pull off a masterpiece. The songwriting of this style of music can be difficult to mould into a whole cohesive story with a definite beginning and ending. The influences they have are used to push themselves forward in a creative sense most of the time, but when they are showing off their influences, it’s not subtle. In all, a very decent first album, and a band to watch, but I feel bigger things could be on their way.

3.5/5

Car Bomb
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Review: The End - “Elementary”

I think the previous outing by Canadian band The End titled “Within Dividia” was largely overlooked. Many people, as did I, saw them at first glance as being similar to Dillinger Escape Plan. A few more listens, and I discovered that “Within Dividia” was quite a bit different than standard Dillinger Escape Plan releases and subsequent clones, with a steady double bass pulse and its roaming jagged guitars. There were of course those itty-bitty moments bringing to mind the ambient moments of Neurosis, but those were mainly saved for taking a break from the action.

The first opening I heard from “Elementary” did remind me of “Within Dividia”, but much more simplified, especially when it moved from those previously mentioned double bass pulses and roaming jagged guitars, to some more easier to digest chords. Indeed, much of the signature sound of the past from The End is still present, even when they go super-light into radio rock moments (and yes, the vocals could be considered “emo” at times).

The second song “The Never Aftermath” threw me for a loop. Jangly chords, completely clean sung vocals. By radio standards, this song is still pretty heavy, and even features a moment in a break where a familiar dissonant tone comes along.

Also featured are some very Maynard James Keenan like vocal moments, as well as a lot of lighter more modern era Neurosis. How does The End pull all this off without becoming sellouts though? To an extent they do it by including some remains of the old The End in small bits and pieces of “Elementary”, but in when all is said and done this new album could be viewed as selling out. And for good reasons.

Lets be honest with ourselves, much of this is moving towards a direction of radio-rock with emo and Tool styled singing. While its difficult to say, it may just be that “Elementary” is a waypoint between their old sound, and a new one.

3/5

The End
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Review: Dimmu Borgir - “In Sorte Diaboli”

It’s hard to make a concept album, because the end result has to be a whole, complete, cohesive album instead of a mere collection of songs. Most people have an album or two in their collection that’s a must have album, an album that is the audio equivalent of a great movie, an album that’s best played as a whole.

“In Sorte Diaboli” opens with “The Serpentine Offering”, a song that begins with an orchestral opening just before getting the album into the midst of the action, mostly with quick/mid-paced songs on the first half of the album. A slow brooding instrumental song “The Fallen Arises” serves as an interlude/intermission in the middle of the album, then re-opens the engagement with a fast song, “The Heretic Hammer”. The second half of the album is very climactic, with the speed in portions of “The Fundamental Alienation”, and the intensity of “The Invaluable Darkness”, before slowing with the closer “The Foreshadowing Furnace”. As you can see, the guys in Dimmu Borgir have put some effort forth in make the arrangements work with peaks and valleys.

Everything is in high polish splendour, in which Dimmu Borgir romanticises the notion of black metal. The cold stark guitar tones, raspy vocals and blast beats keep Dimmu Borgir in line with the origins of black metal. The very well synthesised orchestral arrangements are of movie quality, which helps to add to the epic feel. The operatic vocals from bass player ICS Vortex are utilized more often than on previous Dimmu Borgir releases, and for the most part meld seamlessly into the music (with the exception of the operatic vocals on “The Serpentine Offering”, which seem to come out of nowhere).

Comparing “In Sorte Diaboli” to previous Dimmu Borgir works is where the problem arises. While they’ve put effort forth on a concept for the album, and the arrangements, they come off as an experienced band playing what works instead of pushing any sort of envelope. Sonically, there’s really no difference between “In Sorte Diaboli” and the previous album “Death Cult Armegeddon”.

I’ve never had a situation arise where an album has been pulled together as a whole so well, yet didn’t push any creative boundaries to put itself ahead of the pack. It’s true, many would say that Dimmu Borgir were already at the top of their game before “In Sorte Diaboli”, but this time around it’s themselves they need to best.

3.5/5

Dimmu Borgir
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Review: Type O Negative - “Dead Again”

So many goth bands are cliche. Most of them have women fronting the band, with the reasoning that having a woman front the band will be their “gimmick”. We also can’t forget the typical subject matter - relationships. We’ve all heard relationship songs in one way or another, from songs about being with someone to breaking up and everything in between.

Is Type O Negative the first goth metal band? I’m sure some would debate that question, but they stand at being one of the earliest, and the prototypical goth metal band. As it stands, they also seem to be the most forward moving. “Dead Again” shows the band looking ahead by showing off their personal roots (which may not be goth metal roots to some), and wrapping it in all the familiar Type O Negative trappings.

The warm, comforting ultra-synthetic wash in the guitars, to Pete Steels very low, masculine singing, tag-teamed beside Kenny Hickeys higher grainy singing is still there. Many bands that use keyboards throw fake synths on top of the rest of the music as a background afterthought, but the keyboards of Josh Silver have always been integral to the Type O Negative sound, sometimes hanging around as simple chords quiet in the background, to taking the forefront as realistic pianos, harpsichords, organs and other instruments are still used to their fullest potential as well. Other signatures, like their 80's synth-pop sensibilities are still heavily prevalent.

The real difference in comparison to previous efforts is the amount of songs that are surprisingly fast (but only after a good slow, heavy introduction). The songs that become fast, like “Dead Again”, “Some Stupid Tomorrow”, and “Tripping A Blind Man” are reminiscent of old school 80's hardcore, with other older moments giving a hint of rock from assorted decades sprinkled in subtle doses throughout. Some of the slower moments go right for slow, heavy, and angry by conjuring up Black Sabbath, such as the intro to “Tripping A Blind Man” or taking a small trip to the 70's a bit more with some stoner rock in “An Ode To Locksmiths”.But if you want to hear the hammer come down hard, witness the Russian chant in the middle of the song “September Sun”.

Josh Silver talked about how the last Type O Negative album on Roadrunner, “Life Is Killing Me” ended up sounding like all their previous efforts together at once. It seemed to signal the end of an era, leaving a big name label like Roadrunner, and Pete Steel going to jail and rehab. With all the turmoil put behind themselves recently, it looks as though Type O Negative has a new beginning.

4/5

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Review: Vital Remains - “Icons Of Evil”

I had gotten the previous Vital Remains album “Dechristianize” in 2004. It was an intense album with top-speed death metal drumming, long songs between five and ten minutes long, and power metal styled melodies and harmonies between typically brutal American death metal styled riffs. The biggest downsides from that album was the sound of the snare drum being akin to a “click”, and remember we’re dealing with blast beats all the time, so snare drum gets hit A LOT. That album at times seemed to almost drown in super fast beats all the time, and many of the riffs on “Dechristianize” seemed to lack some depth, often being tremolo picked fare. Albums in the underground can do well more on intensity than great big hooks, and with Glenn Bentons Deicide fame and powerful vocals, Vital Remains quickly became one of the more popular and notable death metal bands.

Having Erik Rutan producing “Icons Of Evil” has solved one big problem right off the bat - the snare drum. Other than that, Vital Remains has improved upon the formula that worked for “Dechristianize”, by having the riffs of the rhythm guitar contain more depth and catchiness. No longer does every riff depend on being picked as fast as possible. The melodies and harmonies on top of the blasting chaos are as good as they were in the previous effort, and are spread out throughout the songs rather than being focussed in a few select areas. Vital Remains even spreads the melody out to the unexpected, yet fitting acoustic portions on “Scorned” and the Spanish flamenco guitar “Reborn... The Upheaval Of Nihility”.

Many of the songs on the first half of “Icons Of Evil” have a bit of a start/stop pattern, with slight pauses before returning to the action, which helps to break up the constant blast of drums. That being said, the drumming is still a constant beatdown that can really chip away at the listeners resolve. The other good qualities help to distract from that constant pulse.

It seems that one year after another, Glenn Benton is able to provide two albums in a row of absolute god-hating in the form of Vital Remains “Icons Of Evil”, and Deicide’s “The Stench Of Redemption”.

3.5/5

Vital Remains
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Review: Poison The Well - “Versions”

When I heard the song “Letter Thing” posted on the internet long before the release of this album, I was hooked. I had to find out what the rest of “Versions” sounds like for myself.

It’s no secret that Poison The Well have been getting ripped off by numerous clone bands. Poison The Well has chosen a path that puts them ahead of the game in terms of creativity, and hopefully longevity by adding some very old-school elements to their core sound. It’s a huge creative left turn that surprisingly turns out heavier than their previous works. So what’s that creative left turn I’m speaking of? Raw, gritty bluesy bar rock and country, yes country music grabbed from decades ago. Further back than the 80's. It’s not slight either, the album is teeming with old-school elements left and right, and Poison The Well integrate screaming vocals, tempos upped by today’s standards, and low distorted heavy slow moments with those old elements seamlessly.

You can expect to hear slide guitars, dirty guitars, horns, and even subtle hints of organs. Little hints of echoing reverb, little bits of feedback intentionally left in, and guitars played so hard that they get pulled out of tune just a little for a moment make for an extremely raw performance. At the same time, the actual recording quality is top notch, and the band’s playing is super tight. It’s a strange combination of slick and raw together, as they typically don’t mesh at all, but in this case it works perfectly.

If there’s something at fault, it’s that some songs are short, and seem like they’re building to something even more powerful, and then simply end without anything to bring the listener down properly. Some people would look at that as simply a way of keeping the energy high, and giving the listener a reason to come back, subconsciously hoping the song will finish properly on the next listen.

“Versions” is no doubt going to be a polarizing album to longtime fans of Poison The Well. One thing is for certain, the new additions in sound were not made with the intention of becoming more popular.

4.5/5

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Review: Cannibal Corpse - Vile (Re-Release)

To many, the concept of Cannibal Corpse is completely laughable (the band name, the artwork, the lyrical content, and sometimes even the music of death metal itself). Perhaps to some, not taking Cannibal Corpse to seriously has led to their success, as many tout Cannibal Corpse as being the biggest death metal band in the world.

“Vile” is said to be the first death metal album on the Billboard top 200, debuting at #122 in 1996. It also marked a big change for the band, as it was the first album with vocalist George “Corpsegrinder” Fisher. “Vile” also marks an evolutionary step for the band growing from their humble simplistic beginnings of mostly power chords up and down the guitar in their earlier days, to incorporating a lot more runs that start to get into more jazz territory. The guitar solos compared to the previous album “The Bleeding” are derived much more from Slayer this time. George “Corpsegringer” Fishers vocals hang around a mid-range to sometimes high death grunt, and his proper diction and pronunciation are certainly much clearer than the previous vocalist Chris Barnes, but sometimes he still slurs his words. From a lyrical standpoint, the band attempts to be creative and some of their attempts work, while other songs come off as simplistic descriptions of slashing.

Production is also an issue. While Cannibal Corpse may have gone with famed death metal producer Scott Burns, his production style was slightly raw rather than powerful. The tuning of the snare drum sounds exactly like the snare drum on every album produced by Scott Burns, and a lot of the instruments have some reverb cranked up. In the early days of death metal, raw styles of production are much more forgivable, especially when it’s a new band looking for a new sound. It can add to the youthful exuberance of an underground band, but in this case, raw death metal production on a 1996 album sounds dated and detracts from the sound.

The song “Devoured By Vermin” has practically become a single being the most chorus driven and hook laden song from “Vile”. Most other songs are a bit forgettable by comparison, although a portion of the song “Bloodlands” is memorable for a bassline that imitates a heartbeat.

On the next album “Gallery Of Suicide”, Cannibal Corpse eschewed all simplistic power chords, and their guitar solos grew beyond cloning Slayer and evolved into a signature style. The vocals became much clearer, and lyrics became more creative. All subsequent albums from “Vile” featured continually better production, more technical playing and catchier songs, although those albums have been extremely similar to the point of stagnation.

The main feature to the re-release of “Vile” isn’t the songs, since the album hasn’t been remastered, instead it comes with a bonus DVD of Cannibal Corpse playing a show in California in 1997. The video quality isn’t top notch, but the band sounds powerful onstage, and they provide lots of headbanging and windmill spinning hair. George doesn’t move much from his spot on stage, but he becomes much more mobile towards the end of the show.

In the end, the real attraction of the “Vile” re-release is the bonus DVD. If you’re the kind of person that wants to own just one Cannibal Corpse album, my suggestion would be the last one, “Kill”. It has the best production and features the catchiest songs.

3.5/5

Cannibal Corpse
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Review: Chimaira - “Resurrection”

It’s been a long time since I’ve done a review. I haven’t gotten very many albums at all recently, and the last two albums I got were too old to review. I didn’t buy “Resurrection” by Chimaira (not yet anyways), as a friend was kind enough to lend it to me, and after listening to it I felt compelled to write a review. A purchase of the album is imminent.

I have to admit, I’ve lost some interest in some of the newer big bands like Lamb Of God and Killswitch Engage. I don’t think their songwriting has gotten worse, I’ve simply lost some interest because they’ve gotten bigger. Chimaira is a band that I haven’t lost interest in, although they seemed to have lost a bit of popularity to Killswitch Engage and Lamb Of God. Perhaps it’s the fact that Chimaira is willing to tour with death metal bands like Nile and Hate Eternal while some other bands only want to do big tours with big bands.

The career arc for Chimaira almost suggests they want to commit commercial suicide. Their first EP “This Present Darkness” in 1999 started off with the modernized thrash sound that listeners have been familiar with for Chimairas last three albums.

In 2001 Chimaira released “Pass Out Of Existence” which is much slower and groove-laden than the rest of their catalogue. It seemed as though “Pass Out Of Existence” was a stab at a much heavier and underground nu-metal sound. “Pass Out Of Existence” has had rumours abound that record label interference, coupled with the band themselves trying to make songs for other people, as well as following the direction the producer wanted led to making that album that way it is.

“The Impossibility Of Reason” in 2003 was a big hit with perfect timing. The band went back to the modernized thrash sound of their EP “This Present Darkness”, and made a purely metal album right when people were looking for real metal bands. “The Impossibility Of Reason” solidified the signature sound of Chimaira, and took influences from old school thrash peers, such as stacking instrumental breaks beside guitar solos, just like Metallica did.

Perhaps it was the influence of Metallica that drove the band to try and go for songs over five minutes that led to their self-titled album. The songs were longer, but in some ways it seemed as though the band forced the songs a little bit longer than they should’ve been. The self-titled album was a slight bit slower in tempo than “The Impossibility Of Reason” which pulled down the level of intensity. The self-titled album seemed to lack the same amount of meaty hook-laden riffs, and it was a long album to sit through. Overall, the self-titled album was still decent.

With “Resurrection”, Chimaira seems to mix their signature sound while at the same time wearing their influences on their sleeve. The guitar solos take heavy inspiration from pre-90's Metallica, with a guitar solo from the song “Resurrection” being reminiscent of Slayer. That’s not the only direct Metallica influence you’ll hear. The nine-minute long "Six" with it’s middle eastern inspired melodies contains some razor-sharp pedal tone styled riffs that have an early Metallica influence written all over them.

The band also wears Nine Inch Nails all over by cranking up the amount of keyboards and industrial samples throughout. Chimiara stretches themselves out with other 90's experimentation, such as the spoken word verses on “Killing The Beast”. It reminded me of a time when nu-metal was fresh and new, and the vocals for the bridge actually sound similar to something Linkin Park would do.

Other experimentation occurs in the final song “Empire”, with blast beats and orchestral synths, they attempt to create an imitation black metal sound. It doesn’t quite work out as well as they hoped, but it’s a decent attempt that doesn’t sound out of place.

Many bands claim that they’re next album will be heavier than the last, and I typically scoff at it since the remark sounds so cliche. I don’t believe Chimaira actually claimed that “Resurrection” would be heaviest album, but it achieves it’s heaviness over their previous work by crafting better songs than the predecessor, upping the tempo, and by sounding so busy. Twin guitar work intertwines itself all over the place with industrial portions on top of that.

“Resurrection” isn’t without it’s fault though, the biggest being the lyrics. Mark Hunter’s attempts at sounding angry come off more like he’s reaching for something personal to be angry about. From hearing “Pleasure In Pain”, “No Reason To Live”, and “End It All” touted during choruses, to the lines “you’re so fucking worthless”, and “I’ll make you fucking bleed”, they all come off as shallow and cliche.

It’s difficult to top “The Impossibility Of Reason”, as it stands as a benchmark in time. “Resurrection” is the next best thing.

3.5/5

Chimaira
Chimaira At MySpace
Chimaira At Ferret
Chimaira At Nuclear Blast
Chimaira At Roadrunner